Learn the way of Sushido!
Sushi Striker: The Way of Sushido is a Puzzle Game developed by indieszero for the Nintendo 3DS and Nintendo Switch, and released on June 8, 2018.
Once upon a time in the ancient world, there was no natural resource of more value to the world than sushi. Soon a crisis broke out between the Empire that sought to hold and enjoy all of the sushi for themselves, and the Republic that wished to share it with the world. This became known as the bitter Sushi Struggle. After a bloody battle that ended in the Republic's defeat, the Empire outlawed even the talk about or consumption of sushi. However a new battle is about to begin.
The player takes on the role of Musashi, a boy or girl orphaned after losing both of their parents in the bitter Sushi Struggles. After Musashi's first taste of sushi, Musashi agrees to join the Sushi Strikers, a group of Republic members that are ready to use the power of sushi and mystical sushi sprites to overthrow the Empire.
The game is a puzzle game where both players stand on opposite sides of sushi conveyors. After matching plates of like colors, Musashi eats the sushi followed by using the plates to attack the opponent. Each player has three lines of sushi along with one shared line they can both use. The striker also employs the use of Sushi Sprites, magical creatures that can give each player an advantage.
Sushi Striker has the following tropes:
- Achievement System: The Triumph Plates serve this in-game function. There are only 15 kinds of Triumphs, but this system is unusual in that each kind takes the form of 9 progressively more difficult accomplishments represented by the nine plate colors in this game. Musashi's Striker Rank is tied to the Triumph Plates, with each promotion requiring a certain minimum number of plates of particular colors.
- After the End: The game takes place long after overconsumption of sushi made every kind of fish extinct.
- Animal Theme Naming: All of the minions serving one of the Empire's Generals are named after a type of animal, including the Generals themselves. Kodiak and his bodybuilders are named after bears, Ausprey and his lovely assistants are named after birds of prey and scavenging birds, Purrsilla and her butlers are named after felines, and Tiburon and his elite troops are named after sharks.
- Anti-Frustration Features: Losing to an opponent repeatedly has a chance of making them drop helpful items to make the fight easier.
- Awesome, but Impractical: The cannon that you run into while near the Empire's gates. The awesome? It's a one hit kill. The impractical? It takes a full minute to charge (which the gunner informs you of consistently) a minute and a half if you want the partial shield upgrade. You can't make sushi while using it so healing skills are worthless and you can only bring along two sushi sprites rather than three.
- Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: Masa. He makes it no secret he's just leading the SLF for power and reveals he only eats the fish part of sushi, never the rice, which is seen as an utter waste by true Sushi Strikers. In fact he was practically the reason why Jubay joined the Empire in the first place.
- Bittersweet Ending: The Empire is defeated, sushi can now be enjoyed by all with no restrictions, and Musashi even reunites with their dad. However the Emperor, Octavius, disappers to "where sushi comes from" who cites humans will grow greedy again and start up the Sushi Struggles once more and Musashi still has no clue if their mother is still alive. With both Jubay and them waiting by the Great Shrine Gate, hoping for the day she'll return.
- Calling Your Attacks: Anytime anyone uses a Sushi Sprite's skill, he or she will yell it out. This goes for everyone in this game, even common enemy encounters.
- Counter-Attack: Several examples:
- Garu-o's Dish Served Cold causes the next attack done to the user to be reciprocated twofold back at the attacker.
- Plate Plunder throws a stack of plates back at the attacker if the user's table is full. If not, it steals the plates and adds them to the user's table.
- Death of a Thousand Cuts: Popokan's Budget Striker skill downgrades the rank of sushi coming out of the user's shrine, but causes it to spawn in larger numbers, resulting in barrages of weak plates.
- Developer's Foresight: Did you intend to use Skill Copy to use unobtainable Sushi Sprites' skills? Well, either they are blocked outright (Skill Copy will pick the most recent skill the opponent has used besides those ones) or the AI will make it as difficult to copy as possible by holding it out until the last minute and immediately using another skill afterward so Skill Copy copies that instead.
- Edible Theme Naming: The basic Imperial soldiers Musashi fights have names pertaining to eating, cooking, or things found in a kitchen. None of them actually share names with food, however.
- Explaining Your Powers to the Enemy: To ridiculous extents with some of the empire forces. Even Musashi calls them out on doing this when they're, you know, enemies?
- Equippable Ally: The Sushi Spirits. Once their gauges are full they can offer a variety of abilities from changing the sushi on the belts, to giving out more of the same one to get a boost of power, to properties like lighting and shields to even the ultimate ability: freezing your opponent in place just from gracefully eating sushi.
- Heroic Rematch:
- Happens over the course of Musashi's journey through the Republic in which Kodiak soundly trounces Musashi right at the start, with Musashi gaining the strength, experience, and Sushi Sprites to eventually overthrow Kodiak just before entering the Empire.
- After Tiburon defeats Musashi by using his Sushido skills, Musashi finds a way to counter Sushido and challenges him again at the front door of the Imperial Palace, with Musashi winning this time around.
- Impossibly Delicious Food: Sushi is so delicious it has superpowers and can bestow powers onto others.
- La Résistance: The Sushi Liberation Front, who seek to free the world of sushi from the Empire's grasp. Turns out they're not on the up and up though as they only consider the fish part of sushi worth eating, not the rice. Musashi calls them out on it and ultimately takes over the organization after beating Masa.
- Last Episode Theme Reprise: The final boss battle is played against an instrumental version of "Sushi No. 1."
- Lethal Joke Character: Uszo's ability, Super Scout, lacks any gameplay function on its own. However, because it lasts so long before it runs out and because Uszo charges it up so quickly, he pairs ridiculously well with Hist-9, the Raw Power derived from tuna, which grants a 15% attack boost any time a timed ability is active.
- Luke, I Am Your Father: The top general of the Imperial Army turns out to be Mushashi's father.
- Might Makes Right: Masa believes that the way he eats sushi is right because he beat Musashi's dad in a duel, but it's obvious that the way he eats sushi is an affront to all sushi sprites.
- Missing Mom: Musashi's mother is said to have thrown herself into the Great Shine Gate in despair after Jubay joined the Empire in the hopes of ending the world's conflict.
- Mood Whiplash: Ridiculous as the sushi-striking is, the story can get rather serious at times.
- Mon: The Sushi Sprites. They even evolve as they level up, granting you better abilities.
- Mundane Made Awesome:
- Sushi Striking in general. Essentially it collecting as much sushi the opponents can, eat as fast as they can while stacking up the empty plates then throwing them at their opponents if they feel they have enough. Silly as it is fierce.
- Sushido, a sushi eating technique that can actually freeze their opponent due to being so poetic. Jubay displays this technique in the first confrontation with Musashi. Musashi themselves learns it after Ara-o, Franklin's Sushi Sprite, makes a pledge to them. Allowing Musashi to counter it when they confront Jubay again.
- The Paralyzer: Well-executed Sushido can render anyone who sees it unable to move, as they are in awe of how beautifully the Sushido practitioner can eat sushi.
- Sequel Hook: Musashi manages to convince their father to help them, they beat the Empire and the world is free to enjoy Sushi again. But Masa is still likely around after his defeat, the Emperor escapes to "Where Sushi Comes From" and their mother is still missing having said she threw herself beyond the Great Shrine Gate. Implying that the adventure is far from over.
- Serious Business: Sushi is pretty much everything in this world and a main source of both food and conflict. The end of the game reveals that this is due to sushi being a rarity due to fish being hunted to extinction and the Sushi Sprites are now the only source of which. As long as sushi is appreciated in its entirety, they continue to exist.
- Shown Their Work: Every Raw Power is named after a vitamin, nutrient, essential element, or health supplement. Some are more obvious than others—it's pretty easy to figure out that Potassi-Yum is named after potassium, but not quite as easy to figure out that A-Tax's namesake is astaxanthin
, a carotenoid that gives salmon its reddish hue. - That Man Is Dead: When Musashi confronts Tiburon who reveals he's Jubay. He proclaims the man known as Jubay is dead.
- Theme Naming: Everyone associated with the Empire has a themed name, with the Emperor's personal guard being themed after magic-related items.
- Wake-Up Call Boss: Despite being an Ineffectual Sympathetic Villain, most of Kojiro's fights serve as these, thanks to his unique Sushi Sprites that you never have access to.
- Hakkan's 8 Plate Wall blocks any stack of 8 plates or less, forcing the player to learn how to make longer chains.
- Konkan's Combo Wall blocks any attack comprised of stacks of different colors, forcing the player to learn the Combo system (throwing stacks of the same colour in succession increases their power).
- War Is Hell: Despite the silly premise, the Sushi Struggles are treated as a very realistic war with people suffering because of it, Musashi included.
- Well-Intentioned Extremist: Tiburon aka Jubay was actually with the SLF and wanted the world to eat sushi together. However he realized Masa, the SLF leader was only in it for power. Thus Jubay defected to the Empire in hopes their methods would improve things. After Musashi defeats him, Jubay, admits he was wrong in his methods.
